World Trade Organization: All You Need To Know about the Recent Negotiation

On May 13 and 14, 2019, India is all set to host the second mini-ministerial meet of the World Trade Organization. The 12th ministerial meeting is to be held at Astana, Kazakhstan in June 2020. Thus, the meeting in India will be a preparatory meeting to come up with solid plans in the next year. The 11th ministerial meeting that was held in Buenos Aires was a complete collapse. Nevertheless, all the members of the WTO tried hard. After this, the mini meeting in India is seen to be very important. There is a line of features to be discussed.

Agreements on Agriculture take the first place. The issue is to put a limit on the subsidies given by both the developed and developing countries for the farmers. OECD report tells that the developed countries are giving more and more subsidies than the developing countries. The USA has denied reducing the subsidies which in turn adversely affects the developing countries. While India is demanding a permanent solution on Public Stockholding to implement the Food Security Act. In the year 2013, in the Bali conference, India secured a Peace Clause.

Under this clause, if India breaches 10% limit than all other countries will not take action under the WTO dispute settlement mechanism. In 2014, India forced all the developed countries that Peace clause will remain until a permanent solution is found.

The second issue is non-Tariff barriers. The developed countries are imposing a lot of nontariff barriers due to which developing countries cannot gain a competitive advantage in the sector of agriculture, textiles, leather, etc. The USA led developed countries, has proposed many E-commerce proposals. However, there is much opposition from the developing countries.